The Origins of 3 Trash Pokemon & the Real Waste Problems Behind Them

There are only three trash Pokemon, and none of them is easy to love. Trash is a hard thing to make cute, and these do not try: one smells bad enough to make people faint, and another launches a toxic liquid that can kill a weakened creature instantly.

See all 3 trash Pokemon in one list.

Here's every trash Pokemon:

All 3 Trash Pokemon

#089

Muk

Muk, the Sludge Pokemon, is a pile of living sludge. It may also be based on the imagined fear that heavy pollution, caused by the leakage or improper disposal of toxic or radioactive waste, could create new and undesirable life. It could also be based on Dorotabo, a one-eyed, three-fingered yokai that rises from the mud of neglected, overgrown rice fields.

Muk smells so awful that it can cause fainting, and its nose has degenerated until it lost its sense of smell. Losing the smell is the only perk of being this foul. It stands 1.2 m tall and weighs 30 kg.

Alolan Muk, the form from the Alola region, may be based on an oil slick, particularly the rainbow colors that appear when a thin layer of oil floats on top of water.

#568

Trubbish

Trubbish, the Trash Bag Pokemon, is based on a trash bag. It was born from a bag stuffed with trash, and Galarian Weezing relish the fumes it belches. Galarian Weezing is a regional form of Weezing from the Galar region, so the garbage here has fans of its own.

It stands 0.6 m tall and weighs 31 kg, which is one kilogram more than Muk (our own bins would like to have a word about that).

#569

Garbodor

Garbodor, the Trash Heap Pokemon, is based on a garbage bag that is bursting with garbage. Its visual design and its Shiny variant's gray coloration may be references to the phrase "dust bunny", which means clumps of lint. Because it seems to be a conscious pile of garbage, it might also be based on tsukumogami, objects that have been possessed by spirits in Japanese folklore.

The toxic liquid it launches from its right arm is so virulent that it can kill a weakened creature instantly. It stands 1.9 m tall and weighs 107.3 kg.

All Three Are Pure Poison Types, and Each Design Points at a Real Waste Problem

Muk, Trubbish and Garbodor are all Poison types with no second type. Their designs come from waste problems that exist outside the games. Muk may come from the fear that heavy pollution could create new and undesirable life. Alolan Muk may be an oil slick, and oil spills are a major threat to ecosystems in the world's oceans and particularly in Hawaii, which Alola is based on. Gigantamax Garbodor is based on a landfill.